


Coming Forth by Day

by GettheSalt



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen, M/M, Original villain - Freeform, Sabriel Minibang, Sabriel Minibang 2012
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-11
Updated: 2012-10-11
Packaged: 2017-11-16 03:09:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 21,519
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/534819
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GettheSalt/pseuds/GettheSalt
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The sensation that someone or something is following you isn't one that most relish. Even for the seasoned hunters that are the Winchesters and Castiel, it isn't a welcome feeling. It's how people end up like Frank Devereaux. And no one wants to end up like Frank Devereaux; at least, not among the three of them. When Sam takes matters into his own hands to shed light on their otherworldly stalker, however, he finds a bit more than he bargained for. And something else too. They say big blessings come in small packages, and with the lingering fear of something at their backs, this is one big blessing in one small package that may just be able to help.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> My second story for the Sabriel Minibang, this one for the 2012 challenge. I had wanted to tackle something that wasn't just a romance, or a comedy, or a rom-com, like last year's Ridiculous. This year, I wanted to go for action and thrills, and hopefully I managed it.
> 
> I could not have done it without the support of my artist, the amazing [AndLatitude](http://andlatitude.tumblr.com) . whose [art](http://andlatitude.livejournal.com/684.html) you will see both here and in the second chapter. Once again, thank you so very much, Steph, for the art you created to accompany this story.
> 
> Now, without further blabbering, I give you, Coming Forth by Day.

“How does a guy end up with a succubus  _this_ persistent on his tail, anyway?”

Sam sighed, leaning back in his chair, rubbing the balls of his palms against his eyes. “Couldn’t tell you, but we picked up the job, so we have to finish it, somehow.” The table top in front of him was covered in various print-outs, shreds and grains of a half dozen different herbs and ingredients that were going to, supposedly, throw the succubus off long enough that they could get her through the heart with some consecrated iron and be done with it. Next to him, Cas was helping to grind and mix some of the herbs together, siphoning them into small glass vials, one for each of them, and another for their client.

This job had turned out to be a lot more work than they’d originally anticipated.

They’d been heading through this relatively unassuming seeming Colorado town, just stopped to pick up supplies, when they heard it. In retrospect, they probably wouldn’t have gotten the job at all if Dean’s burning need for something greasy, and deep fried hadn’t been so bad that they couldn’t pass by the little diner. It had been roundabouts the middle of arguing whether or not they should order another round of burgers (because, oh, right, a vastly powered down Cas still had the appetite of someone sitting next to Famine) that they’d overheard the young priest at the table next to theirs complaining about trouble sleeping, troubling dreams. It had all sounded like one thing to the brothers.

Which, at first, the priest had written off as insane and vaguely heretic. Of course, after they’d burst into his house, uninvited, and scared the succubus off in the middle of feeding, waking him just quick enough for him to catch sight of her taking off, he’d had to change his tune. And then, of course, he’d let them help him.

It wasn’t that they weren’t already busy, either. They’d been racing against Crowley and his forces for the better part of a few months, but both sides had reached a stalemate, and people still needed saving, even when you’re trying to one up the guy who’s one-upped you for what was going on a couple of years. Besides, succubi were far from a difficult thing to deal with.

If you weren’t a hot-blooded male.

She’d figured out quickly enough, in the second night, that Dean would be a pretty good feast too. So, now? They were dealing with a succubus who had two possible targets at any given time, and who was fairly obviously loving that fact. Dean was on a steady regime of the blackest black coffee and no sleep, and the priest, well, Sam didn’t figure he’d be sleeping much until he was assured that what he’d seen was no longer a threat.

“Maybe it’s the whole ‘devout’ thing.”

“That doesn’t explain why she has become so fixated on you, Dean.”

Sam hid his grin behind his shoulder, turning away to continue breaking apart herbs. Castiel, post-purgatory, was, well, the Cas that they had come to know and love, before everything had gone to literal hell. In ways, at least.

Sam felt himself sobering while he dwelt on that. He still wasn’t entirely clear on the details of how it was that Dean and Cas escaped from purgatory. It wasn’t for lack of asking, either, because he’d asked both of them until he was blue in the face. He wanted an explanation, he needed to know, were they them, were they sure it wasn’t something that was going to come back and bite them in the ass somewhere down the road, how, how, how?  They’d given him answers to reassure him, without giving much away. Dean pled the excuse that he really didn’t remember how it had happened, and he was losing more and more memory of his purgatory time every day. Cas merely tight-lipped it, and Sam was clear he wasn’t getting anything more or anything less from the powered-down angel than that. Whatever it was, however it was, that Dean and Castiel had gotten out of purgatory and gotten back to Earth, Sam wasn’t privy to know. At least, not yet.

Maybe some day. But that day wasn’t today, or tomorrow, or, Sam suspected, even next week.

“Hah, funny,” Dean sneered, leveraging himself up from the motel bed to come and plant his hands on the back of Sam’s chair. Leaning over his brother’s shoulder, he hummed, and Sam could see him nodding out of the corner of his eye. “How much longer until these are good to go? I want to try and catch a few before we head over to the padre’s to gank us a hell hooker.”

“Five minutes,” Sam replied, reaching for the vial that Cas was handing him, ready to add the last few ingredients. “Or less. Then you can pass out and stop whining.”

“It ain’t whining, Sammy, it’s commentary,” he leaned forward a touch more, reading over the pages that Sam had spread before him. “So, these’ll keep her off, and then we can jump in and run ‘er through with the fire poker?”

“Essentially,” Cas answered, in lieu of Sam. Dean nodded again and straightened up, holding out his hand for the vial that Sam was corking.

“All right, perfect,” he snatched the vial out of Sam’s hand, dropping it into his jeans pocket. “Wake me in sixty?” he dropped onto the bed, closing his eyes and grimacing. “Actually, make that one-twenty. Then we’ll go finish up this job, and get back on the road?”

“Sounds good to me,” Sam answered, turning back to the table to finish packing the other three vials. “You want food before then, I’m guessing?”

“Double bacon cheeseburger wouldn’t be an unwelcome wake-up.”

“Thought not.”

* * *

 

“Broad had a really nasty left hook.”

That was an understatement, Sam mused, eying the bruising spread along the entire side of Dean’s face. The succubus had been dispatched easily enough, at the end of it all. She’d put up a fair fight, as evidenced by the bruise on Dean’s face, the scratches on Cas’ face, and the tender spots along Sam’s ribs, not to mention the rips in the priest’s clothing. He’d been very thankful, that priest, shaking their hands frantically and offering them money for their services, which they had turned down, even if they needed it. It just didn’t seem right to take money for saving the guy’s life, they had enough illegal, fraudulent credit cards to get by on. For the moment.

“What’s up, Sammy? You’re quiet,” Dean asked, climbing into the driver’s seat of the Impala, closing the door with the customary creak and squeak.  They’d packed everything into the trunk, and Cas was seated snug in the backseat, quiet himself, but clearly listening. Sam had his suspicions that what had transpired in the priest’s home was sitting off kilter with the changed angel too. In fact, he was almost one hundred percent sure it was.

“It’s what the succubus said back there,” Sam answered, turning to lean his side against the door while Dean pulled out onto the road and made for the easiest route onto a highway. “She said it was too late. What’s too late?”

Dean shrugged. “Could be a lot of things. But, you know,” his fingers flicked the turning signal, eyes scanning back and forth along the dark road before he turned the impala onto main street. “Could be nothing, too. You know how these things are, Sam. They like to mess with our heads.”

“What if it had something to do with Crowley?”

That shut Dean right up, and quick. Sam could see the telltale narrowing of his eyes, and the way he pursed his lips, that meant Dean was seriously considering what Sam was bringing up.

“I wondered the same as Sam, actually,” Cas spoke up, leaning forward with a hand curled over the shoulder of Sam’s seat. “What would a succubus have to tell us was ‘too late’ if it didn’t relate to Crowley and his personal mission in some way?”

The silence in the car was deafening and tense. It wasn’t something that Sam was overly fond of, at the end of the day, after a grueling hunt. It wasn’t just Dean either. His silence was tense, and yeah, it was definitely a little angry, bitter, and annoyed, but he wasn’t alone. The silence that was stemming from Cas was confused and cautious, just a little angry and exasperated itself. Sam didn’t dare analyse his own silence, but he knew it to hold the same emotions as theirs. This witch hunt wasn’t a walk in the park, and every day they could feel closer or further away from defining the means and reasoning behind Crowley’s moves.  Now, having a succubus, a  _demon_ in her own right, tell them they were too late, everything seemed much more pressed, wearing them thin the longer the silence stretched on.

“She also said that there was no where he couldn’t be found,” Dean finally spoke up. They were an hour away from the town and there wasn’t much chance of them stopping any time soon.  “What the hell was that supposed to mean? I mean, if she was trying to tell us something about Crowley, doesn’t that seem a little off? Sounds almost like she’d be getting on our side, no where Crowley couldn’t be found. Doesn’t that sit wrong with you guys?”

Sam nodded, shrugging one shoulder. “She did say that,” he conceded. Dean had a fair point, it threw off the pointed suspicions that she was alluding to the smarmy king of hell, one former Fergus McLeod.

“Perhaps she did not mean Crowley at all,” Cas spoke up. Sam glanced back to see that he hadn’t turned to face either of them, and was still sitting with his head turned, watching the darkness speed past outside, one hand cupping his chin. “But in that case, who did she mean?”

“That,” Dean said, raising one finger. “Is the million dollar question.”

* * *

 

It was a few days – and a few more states – before they spoke about the succubus again, crowded around the off-white table in their Kentucky motel.  It wasn’t like they’d had a choice not to speak about her again, though. Outside sources were influencing it, and fast, in ways that definitely weren’t obvious yet, but…

“I wanna know what the hell is going on.”

Sam sighed, pushing a hand back through his hair, turning in his seat. “You’re not the only one. The only thing I can figure is, maybe…”

“Maybe  _what_?” Dean ground out, leaning forward in his own seat, fist on the table. “Sam, we’re being followed.”

It took all of Sam’s strength not to snarl back at his brother.  It wasn’t like he’d missed that point. He did know, though, that snarling and getting into a yelling match with the older Winchester wouldn’t do any of them any good. It wasn’t going to help them figure out who was following them, or what, or why. It would just lead to another pointless yelling match to let off steam, and in the end it would accomplish a grand total of nothing.

Sam understood why Dean was upset though.

It had happened the morning after they’d killed the succubus. They’d woken up and immediately the sensation of being watched had dropped onto the three of them, and that hadn’t gone away. No matter how far away they went, or how underground they got, that feeling persisted. Even Cas was on edge. Especially Cas. Even powered down, he was more intuitive than the two of them, supernaturally speaking, and that morning, he’d outright stated it. Whatever was on their tail, it was supernatural and it was tracking them closely.

“I don’t know what’s following us, okay, Dean?” Sam replied. “But it’s been going on since we killed that succubus. Maybe it’s another one. I mean,” he reached into his jacket pocket, hanging on the chair behind him, and pulled out the vial that they’d thrown together for that job. None of them had made the move to take them out of their jackets (or trenchcoats, Cas was still so fond of that trenchcoat) since then. “Whatever it is, it hasn’t gotten close, right?” He waved the vial around. “Maybe it can’t. Maybe it’s some succubus out for revenge for us ganking a buddy or something.”

Dean nodded, rubbing his lower lip, then passing both hands over his eyes. “Maybe… we’re just being paranoid?”

“Also possible,” Sam agreed, without much feeling behind it.

“We’re gonna end up like Frank,” Dean groaned, getting up from his seat. Apparently, for now, the ‘we’re paranoid’ excuse was more than enough for him. Probably that, mixed with the fact that the vials were keeping whatever it was at bay, was something to calm his concerns for the moment.

But Sam, on the other hand, Sam wasn’t so sure. Something about this didn’t sit right, and if it went on any longer, he was going to find out what.


	2. Chapter 2

The ‘we’re paranoid’ excuse wore out just shy of two weeks later. For Sam, anyway. They were all on edge, the air in the Impala was constantly at a level of tension so high that it would take a Mac truck to break through it. Whatever it was that was trailing them, it was persistent, it wasn’t willing to give up any time soon as far as they could tell, and, maybe the creepiest of all, they got the distinct feeling that whatever the presence was, it was enjoying their annoyance and tension. Dean was more snappish than usual, and even Cas was short-tempered.

Sam had had just about enough.

And that was why he was doing what he was doing, despite knowing that Dean would be none too pleased if and when he found out what had happened. It didn’t really change anything, knowing that, though. He was a grown man, he could make his own decisions, and in the end, he could deal with Dean’s complaining.

Never mind that those exact words were what he told himself every time he got up to something that Dean might not be fully behind...

The motel they were staying at was far from occupied. It was only, as far as Sam had been able to tell when they’d checked in, themselves, a young family, and an old guy who looked like he was stuck in a Jack Daniels coma for the foreseeable future. That left a lot of open rooms along the row of the motel, a lot of places that Sam could hole himself up in for the night and try to coax this thing out.

The only thing was throwing a wrench in his plans was...

“Dude, go, pass out, I got this.”

Dean looked up from his laptop, raising his eyebrows at Sam across the table.

“I’m just saying, man, you look beat, just go crash for a couple of hours, I’ll keep up as long as I can before I crash too.”

Dean shrugged, tipping his head back and finishing the last of his beer, before closing his laptop and nodding. “Yeah, all right. I could use the sleep,” they both glanced over at Cas, who had passed out on one of the beds. The angel, though still retaining some of his abilities, was definitely nowhere near full angelic, and sleep had become one of his favourite activities. It was disconcerting, still, to see Cas that way, after having known him for so long as a being with a lot of power behind him.  Even with a handful of months having passed since he’d powered down, every now and then it came back to hit them just how much things had changed. Whether or not that was for the better was beyond any of their understanding, as of yet.

It didn’t take long for Dean to pass out. Sam knew his brother, and had figured that Dean was at just the right point of exhaustion that he’d be out like a light within a half hour or so. Silently, Sam closed his laptop, grabbed his jacket from the back of his chair, and slid his gun into the waistband of his jeans. The familiar weight of his lock-pick kit hung in his inside pocket. On his way out the door, being as silent as he could, he dug into the breast pocket of the jacket, setting the glass vial on the little dresser by the door.

The door closed behind him with a soft click, and after a short count to five, he judged that neither Dean, nor Cas, was going to wake up and come after him. Checking over his shoulder to make sure the lot was empty and no one was looking his way, he strode down the row of rooms, mentally mapping where the other guests had been before picking a room far enough away from those, and theirs. After one more glance around the lot, he crouched down, pulling the pick kit from his inside pocket, and went to work. You’d think, running a motel like this, just outside the city center, they’d invest in better locks, considering how easily the tumblers fell into place and the lock popped open. Sam was inside the room in a flash, the door closed behind him, his eyes adjusting to the dark. Same basic layout as their room was, except just one bed, instead of two. Same kitchenette set, same couch, same bad painting. Anywhere you could save, right?

Now, the plan, the idea, was to get down to business, to coax this thing out, and find out who or what it was after. And hopefully not die in the process. Easy enough.

Turning on any kind of lights was a bad idea. Anything that would show through the curtains would be a tip-off to the motel owners that someone was, essentially, squatting on their property. Sam had a feeling they wouldn’t feel altogether charitable about that. So, the lights stayed off, and he relied on the glow from the screen of his cell phone to pick his way across the room, towards the squashy off-red couch. When he sat in it, it seemed like it was trying to swallow him into the depths of its cushions. Perfectly uncomfortable, that should keep him from falling asleep just fine.

The room was eerily silent. That made sense, it was just him, no one else. For all of its other faults, the motel, at least, didn’t seem to have any kind of little pest tenants. He couldn’t hear anything crawling around in the walls, or scampering over the ceiling. The most he heard was cars going by on the street outside the lot. The only other light in the room, aside from the glow of his cell phone that had faded after a minute, was the red glowing numbers of the alarm clock.

Until there wasn’t.

As far as first tip offs that he wasn’t alone in the room anymore went, that was a pretty blatant one. Sam’s hand was on his gun in a flash when the numbers blinked out of existence and he was leaned forward on the couch, eyes peering into the dark, tense and listening.

“Oh, you are a brave, brave fool, aren’t you?”

The voice was cool, the words a whisper of breath against his cheek. In a flash he was up, gun pointed into the space where whatever it had been should have been sitting. Even in the dark, he could make out enough to see that the couch was empty. Okay, so, disembodied being. Already his brain was flicking through a mental list of everything they knew of that had the description of being a disembodied voice, or being able to be a disembodied voice.

A cool hand pressed to the back of his neck – no easy feat given how tall he was, and where the voice was now coming from. “Now, that’s not nice. Foolhardy, and just a little endearing, but still not nice.”

Another turn, another stare into nothing. Was it just quick? What the hell...

He took a step back, turning his back to the wall. Whatever it was, he wasn’t going to let it keep getting the jump on him from behind or from the side. After a few steps he was fitted into the corner, eyes scanning the room, searching for something in the dark. This was the worst part about hunts – when whatever you were hunting is happily able to keep itself invisible. Part of Sam was tensed, ready to be tossed. They, the ghosts, demons, monsters and what-have-yous, really seemed to like throwing him around, and he wasn’t in the mood for another concussion.

“All right, I know you’re in here, whatever, whoever, you are. I get it. Just come out. We can talk about this,” Though what there was to talk about with a being that seemed content to stalk them for the rest of their days, Sam wasn’t sure.

“You hunters,” the voice came from somewhere off to his left, in front of the window and curtains, but Sam couldn’t see a thing. “You’re so sure of yourselves. Enough of this.”

Sam braced himself, ready for the hit, willing his instincts to react before whatever this was got its hands or claws or whatever on him.

He braced himself for the hit that never came.

 

* * *

 

 

“If I wanted to hurt you, Sam Winchester, it would have already happened. Please, stop cowering in the corner like a common human, and act like the pig-headed hunter you are.” The voice, something soft and lilting, and carrying an accent he hadn’t quite picked up before, but would pin as coming from somewhere warm, had relocated to his left. It had changed, but only slightly, becoming, like its owner, more corporeal, if such an explanation could be understood. Sam had been through enough in his relatively short lifetime not to gawk at the woman sitting with her legs curled beneath her on the couch, but just slightly. He couldn’t quite make out her features, an issue she seemed to pick up on the second his eyes fell into focus on her. The misshapen lamp on the small table between the two beds clicked on, bathing the room with an off-orange light, and, in its glow, Sam could see her smiling up at him.

She wasn’t anything special, really. Well, that was a lie, but just a bit of one. She didn’t look all that otherworldly, but she was beautiful, he’d agree to that sentiment without argument. Long, thick dark hair was gathered around the back of hair neck to drape over her shoulder, the slight waves of it cascading over her collarbone and curling to an end near the bottom of her ribcage, an assessment Sam could easily make, given the clothing – or lack of – that she was wearing. What she was wearing was some kind of dress, he guessed, that started at a circlet around her neck, and fell down in a drop that curved around her hips and, Sam suspected, ended around her back. The fabric carried on from there in what seemed to be a many layered skirt. The top of the dress did cover her, but left her sides exposed, enough that Sam caught something like scales, or rough, dark leather, disappearing under the curve of her arm when she shifted and gestured to the open half of the couch. The gesture was openly friendly. The look in her eyes – dark, the mirrors of her hair – was far from gentile.

“No thanks,” Instead, he pulled one of the metal and plastic dinette chairs out and sat down in it, facing her carefully the whole time. She hadn’t made any sort of violent move on him yet, but he wouldn’t put it past her. Thankfully, the presence of that scaling, or whatever it was, that he could see more clearly from this angle, at least crossed out the possibility that she could be a succubus.

That did leave open the question of what she was, though, and in the back of his mind, Sam was mentally running a check against every supernatural thing he knew to try and see if she matched up against any of them, any at all. So far, no such luck.

“Suit yourself,” she replied, moving to stretch out the full length of the couch instead. She regarded him while she did, though why, Sam didn’t know. She’d had more than adequate time in the last few weeks to look him up and down and get her visual fill of him that way. Then again, this was probably a posturing thing. A predator sizing up their helpless prey, and he had little doubts that she found him to be venturing on the side of helpless.

Add a display of pride to the mental list of characteristics being spun over in his head, then.

“Don’t you have any questions for me?” she asked after a few minutes of silent staring between the two of them. She was amused by all this, sure, but she wanted to get to the point, she was itching to get to her big monologue. Sam wondered if maybe that indicated that she was something that hadn’t been out and about in the human world for a while. The idea seemed fairly likely.

“A few,” Sam agreed, leaning back just a bit in his chair. “Like who the hell you are, for a start.”

That got a laugh out of her, and something about that laugh had a shiver doing its damnedest to tap dance its way down his spine. It wasn’t human, far from it, it wasn’t even disguised. It sounded  monstrous and wet, a laugh full of teeth.  “Don’t pretend you haven’t been trying to pin me down since the moment I revealed myself, Sam. You’re smart, but you need to play your cards a little closer to the chest with me.” She made a show of getting her laughter under control, then leaned forward gracefully, offering him her hand. He didn’t take it (seriously?) and she withdrew it after a few seconds with a darkly amused smirk. “I, Sam Winchester, am Ammut. I might guess that you’ve heard of me?”

Sam’s brain was off and running, pulling up what he could from his memory on Ammut. He knew that she came from Egyptian mythology, and he knew she was associated with crocodiles, lions and hippos, as she herself was supposed to be something of a chimera. The scaling on her sides and seeming curving onto her breasts now made sense. That was the leathery skin of a crocodile. Other than that, though, he was coming up blank. If – no, _when_ – he got out of this, he’d need to brush up on his Egyptian mythology, and fast, especially if he didn’t get rid of her permanently himself.

“All right, Ammut,” Sam leaned forward himself, bracing his elbows on his knees, hands laid palm to palm in front of him. “Next question, why have you been following us for the last two weeks?”

Ammut snorted derisively, waving her hand. “No build up at all, just straight to the point. You know, there was a time that hunters would gasp and tremble at the explanation of who I was. I miss those days.”

Was this chick for real? She had to be. If it wasn’t for that underlying threat of extreme danger and power, Sam would be rolling his eyes. As it was, he hardly resisted.  “Guess I’ll have to brush up.”

Even though the cool smile hadn’t left her lips, Sam saw the mild annoyance in Ammut’s face. “Very well. I know you’ve all figured out that I’ve been on your tail since you killed the succubus. She wasn’t really a succubus, by and again. She was something of a very good projection. Very true to life, thought for herself and everything. You were good to get rid of her though, she was good enough to truly drain that priest, and then where would we be?”

Sam didn’t really want to think about it.

“That took a bit out of me, and then you all had those vials. I was careful to pick something that could be held off with something I too found repugnant. I enjoyed our merry little chase. Your brother gets very snarly when he’s been made paranoid, doesn’t he?” she paused a second to rearrange her skirts. “But, with that keeping me from getting too close, I had at least lured you to me, and now, I could follow you, and wait until one of you got testy enough to face me. I’ll admit, you weren’t my first choice, but you’ll do. All I want to do is send a message.”

And that right there, that never boded well. Creatures and beings and entities that were clearly a little too heavy on the dark side of the line, wanting to send a message. Almost unconsciously, Sam’s hand tightened around the grip of his gun, a tool that had yet to leave his hand, no matter how harmlessly Ammut was lounging. The firm press of it in his palm was reassuring, even if there was no guarantee it would hold her off or even make her pause.

“And that message would be what?” he prompted, careful to keep his voice level. “What’s your motive for being a second shadow for us the last two weeks?”

The curve of her lips turned dangerous then. “You have something I want, plain and simple as that.” It would be far plainer and far simpler if she explained what, exactly, she wanted, but Sam kept that revelation to himself. “I won’t settle, Sam, for mounting wings on my temple wall. I want the whole thing to mount on the very roof as a testament to me and mine.”

She stood up, the gown falling to the floor and covering her bare feet. When she walked, it dragged on the orange-and-brown pattern carpet, swaying around her legs. Sam got up at her first step and backpedalled, raising his gun and putting the table between them. The dangerous curve of her smile had blossomed into a vicious snarl. “I want, and I shall have, Sam Winchester. You may not have brought it with you, but I know how to bring it running.”

She moved fast, putting one foot on the chair he’d discarded before launching herself across the table. Sam was ready for her, and fired off two shots into her chest, but as he’d feared, it didn’t do much but slow her down for half a second. She didn’t even stop to clutch herself, or gasp or growl at his daring, she just kept coming, and before he could squeeze off a third shot, her hands were encircling his neck and they were crashing to the floor.

She didn’t look like much, or hadn’t, but she’d hit him like a hurricane. She had much more force and strength in her hands than her size betrayed. That was only to be expected, supernatural being and all. She had, at least, made the mistake of giving him enough room to move his legs when they fell, and he took advantage of that, bringing his knees up enough to press against her belly and lift her. Before she’d caught on to his intentions, he’d gotten his hands up around her sides, and was able to toss her onto her back over his head. She landed with a whump, a forced exhale, and that gave him the opening to roll onto his front, gun gripped in his hand, finger curling over the trigger while he pushed up from the floor, finding his feet again. Ammut, for her part, stayed on her back on the scuffed linoleum, perhaps catching her breath, though her lingering smile said otherwise.

“Enough of these human methods,” she announced, waving her hand at him. “Go on, give it another shot, if it will make you feel like you have a fighting chance, Sam.”

“Shut up,” he shot back, keeping the gun trained between her eyes. He should do it, pull the trigger and be done with her, but rationally, he knew that wasn’t something he could dare hope would be a solution. She’d kept coming against the other shots, and headshots made a difference, sometimes, but her continued cockiness was all but screaming that this would not be one of those times.

By the time he’d contemplated this, Ammut was stretching and rolling onto her front, hands braced on the floor, fingers spread, belly pressed to the ground, and he understood well enough. He’d lost his chance and she was back on the offensive. He could always just leave the room. Actually, it was weird that Dean hadn’t woken up at the first few gunshots and come running. Sam couldn’t hear anything from the rest of the motel at all. Either these people were heavy sleepers, or...

“Very well.”

His attention snapped back to Ammut, and suddenly he was liking the idea of leaving the motel and running into traffic a lot more. With any luck, the thing on the floor would follow him and kiss a transport truck. Hopefully it would do more damage to Ammut than to the truck, though he was steadily beginning to doubt it.

Ammut’s face was in the process of elongating, the skin turning mottled and deep green while it did, her eyes going glassy and yellow, sliding down and out as her skull shifted shape. Her hands, pressed to the floor, were growing in bulk, the fingers curling and shortening, thick tawny fur sprouting down her arms, over the backs of her hands, turning under her nails as they darkened and sharpened into lethal looking claws. Sam almost didn’t want to look at whatever was happening at her back end, but the crunch and grind of bone wasn’t easy to ignore, nor was the slick, leathery rump emerging from the torn remains of the gown Ammut had been wearing, stumpy but powerful looking thick legs rising under her. While Sam watched, her hair turned course, her hairline receding from the bumpy patch between her spread eyes, and fanned around her head.

All right.

Part crocodile, part lion, and what looked like part hippo.

Perfect, he couldn’t have blended the killing machine better himself.

Raising his gun again, he pulled the trigger and watched a slug bury itself deep in the fleshy skin between her furry shoulder and chest. Ammut’s jaw opened wide, her pink tongue a red carpet for the trip down into her gullet, and hissed. Sam had only heard that sound before in TV programs, and at the zoo on a school trip. It wasn’t something he was all that excited to be on the receiving end of. Far from, in fact, looking at those teeth. He got off another shot into the leg  wounded in the shoulder, and when  he thought maybe he had a chance to get out of this motel room, in the very least to keep her at bay with common bullets, Ammut stopped sitting pretty and charged.

Charged with jaws wide, claws digging into the linoleum and then the carpet as she advanced on the retreating Winchester, mismatched legs thumping on the floor. It would be quite the picture to behold if you weren’t on the business end of it. The back of Sam’s knees hit the edge of the low slung bed, and he dropped down around it, over the corner and to the floor, his grace betraying his body when he could use it most, leaving him on his ass on the floor.

And Ammut was still coming.

Sam had his gun up, finger on the trigger. He wasn’t going this easily, after everything, this would be a pretty anti-climatic way to bite the bullet.

The gun, however, became obsolete in a gust of hot air and a burst of bright light. A second before, Sam had been bracing for piercing pain in his skin, now he was  throwing an arm over his eyes, lids squeezed tight while he stared into the brightest white he’d seen them painted for a long time, his eyes streaming from the briefest flash.

He might not be able to see, but he could hear well enough.  Ammut was roaring, howling, making all kinds of unhuman sounds, first of challenge, and then of pain. Sam could hear her and whatever the other thing in the room was crashing around, slamming into the walls. The bed next to him lurched away and that, along with the shout of ‘get out of the way, numbskull’ had him opening his protesting eyes, keeping them shielded with one hand while he scrambled to his feet, heading for the door. Whatever was happening in here, he needed to tell Dean and Cas, they needed to get the motel up and get these people out to safety before things got out of that room, and they would. Sam had no disillusions about that.

The motel door opened after a good yank – Ammut and her combatant had clearly slammed into it at some point in the last two minutes – and he was out of the room, pounding the pavement, doing his best to see around the white spots in his vision. The door to the room they’d been set up with was only a few yards away when the scream came, if it could be called that. It sounded like metal being ripped in half as an overture to a lion’s roar. Sam slowed, he couldn’t help it, turning back to face the room he’d just escaped while his feet plodded backwards towards the door. The scream cut off like the plug being pulled on a stereo system, and he was left listening to the ragged sound of his own breathing and his heartbeat drumming away against his ribcage. Somewhere crickets were making their night time cacophony, and cars were still driving back unhindered on the road outside the motel’s lot. The world was behaving like nothing had happened, like an ungodly sound had not just filled the night and made the hair on Sam’s arms stand on edge.

And then, once more, the night was eerily quiet, and Sam was rooted to the spot, watching while something big and white and gold bent and pushed itself out of the open door to the former battleground. It was huge, it had to be, Sam had the express notion that what he was seeing was compacted for Ammut-beating convenience.

Then he was opening his eyes and staring at the very intact interior of that room from his vantage point in the corner, slumped to the floor. In the corner, like he’d never moved, like Ammut had never laid out on that couch and taunted him. The door was closed, and the table, chairs and bed were all the same as they’d been, no new coat of blood painting anything, though everything in Sam’s memory told him it should be.

The only difference was Gabriel, leaning against the wall next to him, arms crossed, eyes closed, the white stick end of a lollipop resting on his lower lip. Sam pulled in a breath, ready to start asking a million and one questions, but Gabriel beat him to it, pushing off the wall, opening his eyes, and letting the lollipop roll to one side of his mouth.

“You need to stop attracting all the crazies to your cranial crisis, kiddo.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, I must credit the amazing [AndLatitude](http://andlatitude.tumblr.com) for the flawless art of Sam and our villain.


	3. Chapter 3

Dean wasn’t happy. Sam couldn’t exactly blame him, he’d known going into it that his older brother was going to be far from fond of his little stunt.

“You endangered all of us by pulling that stunt Sam, not to mention you almost got yourself killed!”  He was standing in the middle of the room, hair mussed from sleep, arms spread in incredulity. Cas, wisely, was staying silent on this, sitting at the edge of his bed, eyes flicking between Dean and Gabriel, though Sam was sure that he agreed with Dean. Hell, Sam himself agreed with Dean. It was stupid, it had endangered all of them, and it had almost gotten him killed. Dreamlike state or not, Sam had been assured in no words by Gabriel that Ammut had meant to do away with him as a message to Dean and Cas, and having been a being that could walk between two lives, killing him via a dream would have been no hard task for her. “Sam, what were you thinking?”

“That I was getting to the bottom of all this,” Sam answered, trying not to raise his voice. His head was already pounding, and Dean was just getting started. He wouldn’t be doing himself any favours if he forced the issue to escalate from the get-go. “We’ve just been sitting on our hands for two weeks, letting things go. Someone needed to find out what the hell was going on, or we were going to end up back in an asylum, and not as part of a job this time!”

Dean’s lips curled, and Sam could see all the tells of his brother trying to keep himself in line. “That wasn’t the way to do it.”

Sam didn’t say anything, just held Dean’s gaze. He wasn’t going to back down from finding out what was after them. Maybe it had been dangerous to do it that way, but it was the easiest solution, and he wasn’t going to feel bad that he’d figured it out once and for all instead of sitting on his hands and waiting for the answer to fall in his lap.

“If I could cut in?”

Both Winchesters turned to look at Castiel, who seemed to have had enough of the back and forth going on, and was ready to introduce another aspect of the night that had all of them in a bit of a state that they were keeping on the back burner until the immediate stupidity of Sam’s actions was agreed upon.

Dean waved his hand, a vague gesture that Cas could continue, dropping into a seat at the table across from Sam, pinching the bridge of his nose. Castiel said nothing, but pointed at Gabriel, a movement that said everything that needed to be said. The previous deceased archangel had helped Sam up from the floor in the other room without a word, and walked with him back to the room he was supposed to have been in. Then he’d switched on the lights and started hollering and clapping. That had gotten Dean and Cas up in short order. With a single hand, Gabriel had stayed their questions regarding his being very much alive, and had pointed at Sam, and then at the protective vial on the table by the door, giving a small ‘discuss’ that had led to Dean’s contained blow-up. Now, Gabriel, from his spot sitting on the other corner of the bed Cas had been taking up, waved lightly with a beatific smile.

“Actually, yeah,” Dean said, picking up on the next issue and leaving Sam for later. Sam had to admit he was just a little relieved.  At least needling at Gabriel would give his brother something else to do, and maybe his righteous anger would simmer down over the course of that. “Where the hell have you been? We could have used you, buddy. Purgatory, for instance. Leviathans, you know, just throwing this stuff out there.”

Gabriel snorted. “Oh Dean, you really haven’t changed all that much, have you? Not on the outside, anyway,” the look he was levelling wasn’t even trained on Sam, but it was making him uncomfortable. Gabriel could see something inside Dean, or knew something, that had changed since their time at the Elysian Fields hotel, something that had come to be over a year of civilian life, fighting Crowley, fighting _Cas,_ fighting the Leviathans, and then Purgatory. Sam had to admire that Dean held Gabriel’s look without so much as a flinch. “As for me, I didn’t get out of Purgatory and back to the world of the living and breathing until recently. Your escape,” he looked from Dean to Cas and back here, “was pretty big news, Purgatory wide.” He shrugged, leaning back on his hands. “I gave it a shot of my own. It took me a bit to rustle the vessel up again, I’ll give you that. I’m kind of attached, and you guys know it. I didn’t think any of you except, maybe, Castiel, would cozy up to me in my true form.”

Sam remembered the stabbing pain that had been in his eyes during the ‘dream’, and the fact that still, now, awake and aware, they were a bit sore and dry. He remembered the thing that had come ambling out of the room towards him, grostesque and beautiful and radiating power. “That,” he pointed, meeting Gabriel’s eyes when he spoke. “That _thing_ was your true form?” He found he wasn’t surprised. The ‘numbskull’ comment in the room, and the presence that it had that was still lingering with him, had felt familiar. He wondered if, in some way, he’d known all along that it was Gabriel.

“Yep,” Gabriel answered without hesitation. “Ain’t I a good looking piece, too?”

Sam smiled wryly down at his hands. Even two, three, four years in Purgatory hadn’t done much to change that so-called humour of Gabriel’s, it seemed. As odd as it was, that was comforting to know.

“That aside,” Castiel spoke up again. “This isn’t to say that you’re free from my curiosity, Gabriel, but, Sam,” Sam looked up again, meeting Cas inquisitive bright blues. “What happened to you?”

Dean made a noise of agreement and turned back to Sam, his full attention back on his brother, post stupid stunt. The look on his face wasn’t hard to interpret; he was expecting an explanation of what had happened in there, and when Sam looked back at Cas and even Gabriel, he saw similar questions on their faces. He had to wonder how much of that was Gabriel playing along, considering he’d flown in and saved the day at the last second.

“All right,” Sam said, rubbing a head over his face. “It, she, whatever—”

“—She,” Gabriel clarified.

Sam tipped his head in thanks. “Came into my head, introduced herself – and her name is Ammut, for the record, Egyptian – wanted to talk, really vaguely too.”

“About what?” Dean prompted, not pausing a second to see if Sam was going to continue on his own. Sam tossed him a look.

“Did you miss the ‘really vaguely’ part of what I just said?” he asked, then held up his hand when Dean’s brows furrowed and he opened his mouth. “I’m not looking for an answer, Dean. What I know is this: her name is Ammut, she’s an old pagan goddess, same pantheon as Osirus. Remember him?”

Dean groaned, leaning back in his chair and scrubbed both hands over his face. “How could I forget?”

“I’m going to jump in here to share that Ammut? Some histories see her as a goddess for sure, she definitely could have been, but just take note that she’s a little bit more of a demon than anything.” Gabriel said, not looking up from where he was unwrapping a chocolate bar he’d pulled out of thin air. Sam supposed it made sense to trust what the guy had to say about the pagans. He’d run with them for a couple of centuries.

“So, what, holy water?” Dean asked.

“Mm,” Gabriel gave a conceding nod. “I should specify pagan demon. She’s pretty much a god in their pantheon, sure, but just not quite as powered up as Osirus woulda been.”

“Good to know,” Dean muttered. “Freaking pagans. Again.”

“Yep,” Sam answered, crossed his arms on the table and leaning forward on them. “She did reveal that we have something that she wants, though.”

Dean chuckled, though there was no humour in it. “We always have something  that somebody wants, don’t we, Sammy?” Sam nodded his agreement. In one way or another, they had been supernatural enemy number one for years, and they always had something that someone wanted, whether it was actually an object, or one of them, or better yet, one of them _dead_.

“Not to out the elephant in the room,” Gabriel spoke up again. “But the thing you two morons have that she wants? Is sitting right in front of you,” he paused for effect. “No, not me,” he added, seeing the thought forming on Dean’s tongue. “She wants Castiel.”

That was certainly a revelation that Sam hadn’t seen coming. If his eyebrows had crawled into his hair, he wouldn’t have been surprised. Dean’s eyes were wide with a cocktail of emotions ranging from confusion to anger. Cas, for his part, was silent, eying Gabriel carefully, as though he was reading the truth or lie of his brother’s words in his relaxed posture.

“What the fuck does that old world demon, goddess, whatever, want with Cas?” Dean finally got out, his voice thick and gruff with anger. Sam couldn’t blame him. Cas was family, they were as fiercely protective over him as they’d been over each other, over their father and over Bobby, Ellen and Jo. The idea that Ammut wanted Cas bad enough that her idea of sending a message would have been to rip Sam apart wasn’t altogether comforting.

“Well, you see,” Gabriel said, standing up from the bed. “Castiel here pissed off a whole lot of people with that whole New God World Tour he took while under the influence. I imagine it might have something to do with that. Not to mention the encore performance by Dick and the Romans. Some of the pagans stayed under the radar during all of that and got to keep their heads, some didn’t. If Ammut’s acting this way, I’m willing to bet that someone took out Maat.”

“Maat?”

“Egyptian goddess of truth, justice, all those good things. Kind of like Ammut’s running mate, you could say. They go way back, is all. And if Cas and his follow up act, you know, took her off the top of the charts, I can’t say I’m surprised if Ammut’s out for a little blood.”

“No one is laughing, Gabriel,” Castiel said quietly.

“Do you see me cracking up?” The statement was rhetorical, and harmless enough, but Sam could feel the tension in the air as Gabriel spoke. He wasn’t as amused by all this as his words would have them believe, and he wasn’t as relaxed about it as his tone let on. The tension sat in the air until Dean rubbed his eyes and sighed loudly, a sign that the moment should break.

“Okay, let me get this straight,” he said, leaning forward and bracing his elbows on his knees. “Cleopatra wants to, what, have a little angel barbeque?

“Well,” Sam conceded. “She said she wasn’t going to settle for mounting wings on her temple wall, so I’m gonna go with yeah.”

Dean didn’t respond, just kept his gaze trained on the floor, clearly deep in thought. After a minute he gave a single nod, though when he spoke his tones were sarcastic. “Good.”

“Dean, Sam, if it is me that she wants, I am not adverse to atoning—”

Dean cut across what Castiel was saying without a second thought. “You atoned in Purgatory, dude.”

“And besides,” Gabriel chimed in. “The whole Winchester self-sacrifice thing is so overdone, and it doesn’t look so good anymore.”

A sigh and a nod to show that he’d consent, for the moment, to their arguments, and then Cas asked, “Then what would you suggest?”

Sam thought about it for a second. They were a little limited in what their options were, in this case. They were no doubt protected for now by the vials, but they couldn’t live the rest of their natural lives with Ammut dogging their steps. And who knew what kind of move she would make next in order to get to Cas, who know what lengths she was willing to go to? Innocent people could end up in the crossfire. “We can’t really afford not to go after her...”

“Why?” Dean asked, “She isn’t hurting anyone else, and as long as we keep the wards up, I don’t think she can get through.”

“She isn’t hurting anyone else, _yet_ ,” Sam pointed out. Dean paused, then tipped his head to the side, seeing Sam’s point.

“All right, fine. But the wards are keeping her out for the moment, and if Gabriel did a number on her, I don’t think she’ll be running off to rip anyone apart just yet. I say we get some shut eye, everyone keep the vials close by, and in the morning we do a little old fashioned research,” he shot Sam a teasing smirk, the first in a long while, it seemed, “And haul tail out of here. She can’t come after Cas yet this way. Let her come to us when we’re ready, and we’ll give her a nice, friendly, Winchester greeting. That work for everyone?”

“The slow and easy approach?” Gabriel said, raising an eyebrow. “From you boneheads? Colour me shocked, I didn’t see it comin’.”

“Well, we’re kind of in the middle of something,” Sam offered up. “Just taking jobs along the way, we’re on a trail. And you...”

He trailed off, not finishing his thought, and neither Dean or Cas took it up for him, though they were all on board. Gabriel was back, and he seemed content just to hang around while they dealt with a pagan crazy.

“You know what?” Dean said, getting to his feet. “I am way too tired for that discussion right now. That can wait until morning, if shorty here plans on sticking around.”

Gabriel stood up, walking over to occupy the chair that Dean had just vacated, making a show of getting himself comfortable. In response, Dean rolled his eyes and walked over to the couch, pulling the top sheet from his previous bed as he went, before dropping down into the squashy thing. “Sammy, you take my bed, get some sleep.” Castiel was moving back under the sheets of his own bed, even while he was regarding Gabriel. Sam wasn’t sure what the look in his eyes was exactly, but it didn’t look angered or malicious, so he figured it was fine to wait until morning for an explanation on that front, too.  More than likely Cas was just trying to make Gabriel stay with the force of his look. He remembered well enough doing that same thing when Dean had come back from Hell.

Sam got up and quickly undid the buttons on his shirt, leaving him with his thin T-shirt and jeans. He glanced at Gabriel and then, figuring if Dean didn’t give the angel the courtesy of pants over his boxers, there was no reason for him to do the same, stripped his jeans off. He tossed them over the top of his duffel, then picked up the vial from the tabletop, carrying it with him to set on the bedside table.

He reached over to turn out the lamp, but caught Gabriel’s gaze carefully before. He hadn’t moved from his spot at the table, though he did waggle his eyebrows when he Sam looked his way.

“Seriously, Gabriel,” he warned. “Don’t go anywhere.”

Just before he turned off the light, he caught Gabriel’s grin and wink. That would have to be assurance enough.

 

* * *

 

 

The next morning brought crappy sleep all around. Sam suspected none of them had really slept at all, just dozed in and out. Gabriel, of course, being an angel, had chosen not to sleep, so when Sam lifted his head from the pillow and gave up on the chance of  successful sleep, he was greeted with a cheery, “Morning, beautiful!” being called from the kitchen table, where he’d set himself up with Sam’s laptop.

“Quiet it down,” Dean grumbled, his face pressed into the back of the couch. Sam edged himself out of bed, moving over to pat Dean on the shoulder. “Hey, man, you can have the bed for a bit, if that’ll help?”

Dean groaned his appreciation, rolling onto his back and blinking up at Sam blearily. “I feel like I’m made of wood, I’m so stiff, Sammy.”

“And you two wonder where all that fanfiction for Chuck’s books came from,” Gabriel said just loud enough to be heard. Sam pursed his lips and narrowed his eyes, glaring over his shoulder at the archangel. Gabriel only grinned and winked again. That was becoming an annoying habit.

“Shut up, Gabriel,” Dean retorted, voice rough with sleep, picking himself up from the couch to go crawl into the bed. “That couch is from hell.”

“Hey,” Sam said, grabbing his jeans and a clean shirt and set of boxers from his duffel, heading into the bathroom. “You volunteered. Not my fault, not Cas’ fault.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Dean grumbled. Sam stepped into the bathroom, leaving the door open enough to hear him. “I’m going to catch a few more minutes, why don’t you and Mouthpiece over there go get breakfast, bring me something greasy with coffee. I know you’re just itching to get your nerd on all over Gabriel, Sammy, go get goin’.”

Sam huffed, slipping the clean boxers over his hips before leaning over to stick his head out of the bathroom. “Yes, your highness. Anything else?”

Dean held up a thumb up, and Sam rolled his eyes, the discussion apparently over. He stepped back into the bathroom to finish his morning routine, dressing and tossing his old clothes in a ball on the floor while he finger combed his hair and then turned to brushing his teeth. He was just about done that when Gabriel came in, shaking his jacket at him. “Hurry it up, Samsquatch, I’m hungry and bored.”

“So schnap up some foo’,” Sam grumbled around the minty froth and purple plastic in his mouth. Gabriel’s reflection raised an eyebrow.

“I’m sorry, what was that?”

Sam breathed out through his nose, leaning over to spit into the sink basin. “I said, if you’re so hungry, then snap up some food.”

Gabriel blinked at him like he’d grown a second head. “But Sam, you’re supposed to be nerding all over me at a diner. Big brother said so.”

Sam rinsed his mouth and grabbed his jacket from Gabriel’s outstretched hand, stalking into the room and grabbing his boots. Gabriel walked past him to open the door, rocking on his heels while Sam laced up his boots and grabbed his wallet. As an afterthought, he went and grabbed the vial from the bedside table. Dean, sprawled out across the bed on his front, made an approving hum that let Sam know his brother hadn’t been quite asleep yet.

Then the two of them were out the door, walking around the perimeter of the lot, and heading down the street to the diner that Sam had seen when the Impala had been pulling in the night before.

“Aw, kiddo, I thought you were a morning person!”

“And I thought you were dead,” Sam shot back. It came out a little more bitter and angrier than it necessarily needed to, but Sam didn’t take it back.

“I was, didja miss me?”

Sam tossed Gabriel a look, trying to read his face. The former trickster was smiling, and he seemed entirely content, he was just saying the right things to get to Sam, maybe, probably. The same way he always had. Gabriel had a knack for getting under people’s skin, that was something Sam had figured out early on. Gabriel was just ribbing, here, he wasn’t out for anything. Still...

Sam’s voice, when he spoke was flat and monotonous, and his answer was blunt. “Yes.” Gabriel actually looked a little surprised by, if not his words, then his tone. “I thought – we all thought – you were out of the picture for good, now you show up, hot on the heels of some wacko pagan chick who you might have been poker buddies with once?”

“You’re saying you don’t trust me?” Gabriel asked, his eyes narrowed. Sam didn’t deign to respect that with a response. It was fairly obvious that he wasn’t willing to trust Gabriel entirely, with circumstances as they were. “After what I did for you and Dean and your entire race? Your entire planet, if we’re going to be literal about what the price tag was?”

All right, he had a point. And so far, he’d been acting pretty agreeably. If he’d been up to something, Sam was fairly sure he’d had more than enough time to set it into motion while they’d all been going in and out of sleep last night. “Yeah, I’m being unreasonable. I get it.”

“I’m a bit hurt there, jumbo,” he pushed passed Sam, opening the door to the diner. Sam rolled his eyes at the behaviour, huffy actions he was all too used to from Dean, and followed.

And almost immediately wished he hadn’t.

“Can’t stay unless you order something, Cal. You know the rules.”

“Some coffee.”

Sam was reaching forward to grip his hands on Gabriel’s jacket before he’d taken three steps into the diner. “Gabriel, no.” The tail end of his statement trailed off in a growl, his eyes flicking back and forth between the all too familiar yellow dress the waitress, Doris, was wearing, and the back of Gabriel’s head.

“Oh, sorry,” Gabriel said, turning his head just enough that Sam could see the tip of the smirk twisting his mouth. Asshole. “I thought you’d like the nostalgia. Maybe it would make you trust that _it’s me,_ and, this time, I don’t have any super secret designs, a little bit more,” he shrugged Sam’s hands off grandly and made a show of snapping his fingers. In an instant the diner from Broward County dissolved into a diner that was more cramped, with waitresses wearing off-pink blouses and black slacks, a stark difference from Doris’ yellow dress. A middle-aged Hispanic woman approached them, smiling widely.

“Table for two, gentlemen, or will this be a take-away order?”

Sam opened his mouth to answer that they’d just be ordering to go, but Gabriel jumped over him. “Little bit of both, Janina. Myself, and Sam here, are eating in, then we’ll be taking food back to our sleepy roommates.” Sam couldn’t see his face, but he had an idea enough of the charming grin he was shooting Janina, by the way she was smiling back and giggling.

“Follow me, then,” she said, grabbing some menus off the bar as she led them towards the line of booths at the window. Sam slid into one side of the booth, Gabriel into the other, and they both shot their waitress smiles as she assured them she’d be back and went to check on her other tables, giving them time to choose their meals.

“I’m gonna go out on a whim,” Gabriel said, flipping open his menu. “And guess that doing that wasn’t the way to convince you.” He looked over the edge of the laminated cardstock. Sam could tell he was at least trying to look a little chagrined. Maybe he didn’t have any ulterior motives in this case, which, just maybe, would be a first for the archangel in the time that Sam had known him. Nothing that he could gain from this, no front he was putting up to hide the fact that, just maybe, he could be a good guy.

“Not really,” he answered, looking back down at his menu. “Worked, though.” He didn’t bother looking to see if Gabriel grinned with triumph at that; if anything, he could hear the damn grin in the other’s agreeing hum. Maybe it hadn’t been the way to get rid of Sam’s lingering distrust that this was Gabriel through and through, and it certainly wasn’t destroying his suspicions that Gabriel was up to something, at least not completely. But the guy was trying, and maybe Sam could give him the benefit of the doubt, at least for a few hours. If he was up to something, hopefully it would become clear, and fast.

Janina came by just a few minutes later, smiling radiantly at both of them, and Sam was inclined to return it, this time. Now that his nerves had calmed from his reminder of pig-in-a-poke and Cal the shooter. “You boys ready to order?”

Sam ordered coffee and toast. He wasn’t feeling all that hungry, maybe it was a lingering side effect from getting tossed around and strangled by a half-mad Egyptian demon-slash-goddess in her own mind. Sometimes he just had these mornings when eating was the last thing on his mind. Gabriel, though, ordered chocolate milk, and a double order of chocolate chip pancakes with syrup. In Sam’s experience, waitresses tended to eye grown men ordering things like that with a bit of a skeptically raised eyebrow. Apparently Gabriel was just charming enough to get out of that, though Janina had faltered for a half second before she scribbled down his order. In the minute that she left, though, the silence between them descended again, and Sam was a little thrown to find it just a little deafening.

After a few minutes of Sam faux-distracted fiddling with his phone and looking out the window, Gabriel apparently gave up on the imposing silence and leaned forward with a sigh, arms crossed on the table in front of him. “You wanna know?”

That took Sam a second to follow, a second to pick up on what he was asking about. Then it clicked.

“You got out the same way that Dean and Cas did, which is apparently not up for discussion as far as they go,” he did his best not to sound bitter and put out about that. Dean would open up when he was ready, Sam knew that. It just grated on his nerves at times when he was waiting for an answer that may never come to light. “And then, you took your sweet time letting us – or at least Cas, dude, he’s your _brother_ – know that you—”

“Whoa, excuse me?” Sam clamped down on his tongue at Gabriel’s interruption. He was so used to the guy being non-chalant and brushing things off that the two times now that Gabriel had gotten serious on him were still kind of sending him reeling. “I didn’t owe you knuckleheads anything, let alone a card in the mail, ‘Hey! I’m alive!’” his gold-brown eyes narrowed in annoyance, his lip curled just a bit in a show of just how irked with that notion he was. “You forget, you’ve tried to kill me three times before, and we may have parted friends, but I don’t think we parted BFFs.” He paused for a minute while Janina approached, laying down two napkins and their drinks, before assuring them the food was on the way, and walking off again. “Why in the hell would you give a damn whether or not I was up and kicking?”

Sam was fairly sure that his quiet, “I just did,” surprised Gabriel. It had surprised him. Normally, such a statement would be loaded with the need for validation. If Dean had delivered it, it would have been an order, _I just did, it was what you were supposed to do_. Sam was half-sure that was what he’d been going for, he’d intended to put up the hard front that came to Dean so easily. Instead, it came out as a bald-faced matter of fact. Gabriel leaned back in his seat, looking at Sam even though his eyes seemed a million miles elsewhere.

“You have too big of a heart for your own damn good, kid.”

That was the last they said for a while. Janina came to the table with their food and they dug in without comment to each other, Sam preoccupying himself with trying to find suitable items on the menu for both Dean and Cas’ tastes. Eventually, though, the silence, as it was wont to do, became too forced.

“I’m not looking for compliments, Gabriel,” Sam said, finishing off the last of his toast.

Gabriel seemed relieved for the opportunity to continue the conversation, if that was possible. Sam thought maybe he was even less fond of the forced silence than he himself had been. “And I wasn’t handing them out. You stated a fact, I stated a fact. Your heart’s too damn big sometimes. You care too much, you always have. Didn’t I warn you about that before?”

“Uh,” Sam couldn’t help the lopsided, sarcastic smile. “You warned me about what would happen if I didn’t let Dean go.”

“It was implied,” Gabriel answered with a wave of his hand. The pancakes on his plate were already just about decimated, and he’d yet to touch his chocolate milk. “Anyway, the point is, I busted out because I saw the chance. Purgatory isn’t fun, Sam. Not for me, especially not for your brother or Castiel. It’s like battle royale in there. I’m not surprised they don’t want to talk about it. Give them time, give them space.” Now he reached for his chocolate milk, downing half the glass while Sam waited to see if he was going to go on. He was. “You’re lucky they’re walkin’ and talkin’.”

Sam nodded. “Yeah, I’d gotten that. I was surprised they were doing as well as they were, and they weren’t doing well, not when they got out. Dean could barely string two sentences together when he called me the first time...” It was hard for the memory of that phone call not to stick in Sam’s head. Dean had sounded panicked and out of breath and hoarse, and only half-sane. Sam had gone into it weapons up, hoping against hope that it was his brother. And yeah, it had been, and the angel who’d perched on their shoulder too long for his own good and was stuck in the quagmire of their bad luck now too. They’d been half-wild, crazy eyes taking in a dozen things at once, dirty, and Sam hadn’t thought there was a way to bring them back to themselves. Somehow, over time, everything had evened out, and they didn’t talk about it, Sam didn’t ask. The crazed, half-mad look had been enough of an omen of what awaited if they were pushed too soon. “But you... You seem better off. What about you?”

Classy as always, Gabriel talked out of the side of his mouth, the rest of it crammed full of syrup drenched chocolatey pancake. “Got out, stuck with no vessel. John Doe, case closed, body cremated, maybe, or more likely Luci’s the one who took care of that. Either way, my vessel,” he gestured to himself with his sticky fork, pausing to swallow. “My vessel was in need of repairs, and that meant now that I was out, without a vessel, I was stuck in all the glory – hah – of my true form. I had to go underground, and fast. A little more underground than I necessarily like, so I’d have time to get myself back together.”

“How underground?”

Gabriel shot him a cheeky grin. “Does a gopher sound good?”

“You possessed a gopher?” Sam asked, incredulous.

“Pretty much, yeah,” Gabriel answered with a small shrug, shoving a forkful of pancake – the last of it – into his mouth.

Sam was still pretty stuck on the idea of Gabriel the gopher archangel. “You can do that?”

Another shrug. “Animals are a whole lot easier to get into than humans. Don’t have to follow a bloodline, and they generally consent pretty easy—”

“—Consent?”

“—Call me Dr. Dolittle, I can talk with the animals,” he shoved his plate away a bit, picking up his glass of milk once more. Sam couldn’t help but smile, just a little, shaking his head. Possess a gopher, pass it off as being Dr. Dolittle. Yep, this was Gabriel.

“So, then what? You’re not a gopher now.”

“Ah,” Gabriel pointed at him, much like the professor coming to the big reveal. “No, I’m not. But, possessing the gopher let me regain my strength. Had to let it build back up, it was pretty low down on the gauge. Built the gopher a nice little den while I did that, and then moved to a red fox when I was strong enough to start moving cross country, little more in the open.”

Sam found that he was completely engrossed in this story. It was so fantastic, it couldn't possibly be true, but he knew it was, it had to be, because Gabriel was so fantastic he couldn’t be real, certainly Dean, master of the universe that he was, had never thought Gabriel or Cas or any of their kind was real, but they were. So, what was so outlandish about an angel possessing a fox when they’d seen a hundred and one other things the angels could do?

Not much.

He took another sip of his coffee and made a movement with his hand, willing Gabriel to continue his story.

“So, by that point, I was basically back on my feet, I just didn’t have my vessel, this old thing, back together. That was, I’d guess,” he looked at the ceiling while he thought. “I’d say about two weeks ago? Two and a half, tops.”

That revelation had Sam’s jaw falling open. “You were a fox _two weeks ago_?”

Gabriel didn’t miss a beat, “You sayin’ I’m not a fox now, Sam?”

The gape disappeared in favour of a flat stare. Gabriel grinned back at him, cheeky, and winked. “I gotta say, I think I did miss that bitchface of yours after all,” he ignored Sam’s hardened glare and went on. “Anyway, I put myself back together, literally. Had to go find where the remains had gotten off to, and remake the ashes. I could have just seen about following the bloodline down to someone living today, but I’d gotten pretty fond of this old body. Plus, there’s always a chance of the bloodline dying out. I took over so this guy, dying already, could go with his wife and kid to the great garden upstairs. I’m attached.” Sam nodded. He wouldn’t have pegged Gabriel to have cared so much, and getting that little in on what had led to him taking over the body from its original owner was interesting. “The fox body was good for getting on the road and tracking myself down. I found out where the authorities had put the remains, dug them up – and that took a little bit of work, you understand. I couldn’t dig in broad daylight, can’t light up a cemetery in the dead of night, and animal bodies aren’t made to possess a grace that is in action, so I had to pick one night and go. I couldn’t stop until I’d dug that box up and gotten it out. Seriously, Sam, you’d be impressed if you could have seen this fox go,” he trailed off, his eyes fixing on a point over Sam’s shoulder, and a few seconds later, Janina came up next to them.

“You boys certainly polished that off fast!” she commented, taking their empty plates. “Can I get anything else for you? More coffee, chocolate milk? Were you ready to order for your roommates?”

Sam glanced at Gabriel, then nodded, picking up the menu. “You know what, I will take another coffee, but I think, for the roommates, we’ll be getting the French toast to go, with homefries, and the breakfast sandwich, possibly with extra bacon? And two coffees, black.” He figured that was good. Cas had various tastes when it came to breakfast foods, but if Sam remembered right, he was particularly enamoured with French toast and homefries. The breakfast sandwich consisted of egg, bacon, sausage and cheese, and came with hashbrowns. Sam had seen those hashbrowns walk by on a plate not long ago. They looked greasy enough for Dean’s tastes. Janina nodded, trotting off to the kitchen again, promising she’d be back in a minute with the coffee, and the food would be just a little longer. Sam turned back to Gabriel to find that his glass had refilled itself.

“So, once you dug the ashes up?”

“Jumping right back in, aren’t we, Sammy?”

“Hey, you’ve got me hooked, you can’t leave it there,” Sam said, defensive. He honestly was unbearably curious to find out how Gabriel as he was now had come to be when he was a fox not all that long ago.

“All right,” Gabriel conceded. “So, I dug ‘em up and made off with them to rebuild. This vessel is pretty much my own creation now. It didn’t look like this, too long ago for you to comprehend. I had to convince all those pagans up north that I was their trickster god. You would think they would have suspected things sooner, or, you know, ever, without Kali pointing it out, but I’m just that good.”

“So, wait,” Sam interrupted. “What you’re saying is that over the course of, two thousand, whatever, years, you’ve overhauled this body?”

“Pretty much, yeah. Pimped my ride.”

“So, essentially, you’ve created your own vessel.”

Gabriel was quiet for a second, making a face while he thought it over. “Yes and no. Remember, when I first got this thing, it belonged to a human. I was undercover for a while in that body, and ran into a pagan or two. Ended up striking a bargain for myself, and you’re smart, you can figure out with who. He was known as a shape-shifter, so it wasn’t hard for me to change a few things here and there and pass myself off to Odin and company as Loki. As time went on, I changed more about the features, but essentially, down to the bare bones, this is still a body that once belonged to a plague-ridden northern nomad. I’ve done a lot of work on it though, so, like I said before, I am pretty attached. I couldn’t give up on the old thing without at least trying to rebuild it with the original parts.”

On one hand, Sam was happily drowning in learning all of this about Gabriel’s past. He’d had some ideas on how Gabriel had come by his vessel, so getting the facts, even briefly, was a privilege. On the other hand... “That’s a little bit disturbing.”

“I am one hundred percent recycled parts,” Gabriel said proudly.

“Gabriel...”

“Yeah, yeah, I get it, gross. Anyway—”

“—Not gross,” Sam interjected. “Just don’t talk about it like that. You clearly have reasons to be attached to the body, don’t play it off to come off cooler than you are about the whole thing. I’ve had enough of that from too many people. It makes it hard to believe you care if you play it a different way.”

“You got it,” Gabriel said with a nod. “So, once I’d rebuilt my vessel, I climbed back in, made sure all the parts were in working order, let that fox go off, and then started putting feelers out for you morons. That’s how I found out what Ammut was after. Hell, that’s how I found you bozos period. She was making quite a bit of noise, it was hard to miss.”

“Why is she, though?”

“Whoa, hey, who’s the one telling the story here, kiddo? Be patient.” Gabriel elected not to comment on the look Sam gave him this time, though his eyes sparked with amusement. “Now, I run into her, disguise myself, and find out she’s out for revenge. And it wasn’t against you two in particular, for once, even though you put down Osiris for another nap. And for that, just let me extend my congratulations, that’s magnificent.”

“Thanks,” Sam said, pausing to accept his fresh coffee from Janina. He had to wonder if their waitress was catching any of their conversation on all these back and forth trips. He thought their voices were hushed enough, but stringing together bits and pieces, if she had heard, she could come up with a pretty disturbing picture.

“Don’t mention it,” Gabriel replied with another wave. “So, she’s up in arms, all in a rage, because Cas may have picked off one or two of her buddies while he was DUI, and of course, the Leviathans weren’t in the market for competition. He brought the big uglies out to play, and they chomped down pretty hard on a lot of her old running mates. Like I said, weren’t too fond of any kind of competition, those fish.”

Sam nodded, remembering all too well how driven and vicious Dick Roman and his underlings had been in their pursuit of farming humans for themselves. “So, she’s out for blood?”

“Wants to take a little off the top for damages incurred, yeah. Way I got it, she figures if she has to live without her posse, Cas doesn’t have to live. Problem solved.”

“Wow,” was all Sam got out after a minute of processing through that. The fallout from the Leviathans was going to be following them for a while, he was sure of it.

“Pagans, huh?” Gabriel commented, tipping his head back to finish off his drink.

“Actually,” Sam admitted, feeling just a bit sheepish. “It doesn’t sound that far off from things that Dean and I have done where family’s involved.”

“Aw,” Gabriel crooned. “You have something in common!”

Sam ignored that. “So, how do we put her down?”

“See, that’s the thing,” Gabriel said, tapping the tabletop. “I got nothing. That’s where you and Deano have to pick up the ball and run.”

Sam could see Janina approaching with the bill and their food to go as he nodded. They were definitely going to have their work cut out for them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once more, I have to thank [AndLatitude](http://andlatitude.tumblr.com) for the flawless art of Sam and Gabriel on their breakfast catch-up/date.


	4. Chapter 4

On their return to the motel, they’d found Dean and Cas both up and about, and ready for food and to be filled in on what Gabriel knew. It hadn’t been, really, a whole lot more than they’d already gotten last night, but Sam repeated it for them anyway while they ate and Gabriel lounged on one of the beds with his laptop. He still wasn’t sure why the archangel was hanging around, but he wasn’t going to complain. Dean had begun to ask more about what they’d discussed – they’d been gone way too long for the little information that Sam had given over – but Sam cut him off with promises that he’d go over it with him sometime later. Right now, Gabriel’s gopher-fox adventures weren’t the important thing. Dean had agreed with a look that Sam knew meant he wasn’t going to forget to ask again when this was over.

“So, what we have to do is figure out how to bring her down before she gets her jaws around Cas?”

“Yep,” Gabriel piped up from the bed. “And trust me, you don’t want her jaws around him.” He closed the laptop and straightened up. “Sam’s seen those things. You really don’t want them on him.”

Dean, sitting across from Sam at the table, turned his own laptop to face Gabriel. “Yeah, I kind of gathered that.” Sam didn’t know for sure what was on the screen, but he had a sneaking suspicion that is was some illustration of Ammut.

Castiel was leaning over Dean’s shoulder, and had apparently been absorbing more of the article than Dean himself. “Her name means ‘to die a second time’. This whole even seems somewhat foreseen.”

“You aren’t dying, Cas,” Sam said with an air of finality that Dean backed up with a flat ‘no’ of his own. Cas spared Sam a look, but the one that he shared with Dean went far longer and it said tomes more. Sam was aware that since purgatory his brother’s relationship with the angel had changed, to put things lightly. They’d been through things together that Sam had yet to figure out, and they’d come out of it, if possible, even closer than before. Gabriel cleared his throat, raising an eyebrow at Sam, and the staring contest that he suspected was a silent argument ended, Dean turning back to the computer.

“It says here she was never actually a goddess, like Gabe told us, so that makes her something of a demon. I’m telling you, that has to make her easier to kill than, say, Osiris, right?”

“Again,” Gabriel said with a long-suffering note. “ _Pagan_ demon.”

“There’s a difference?” Dean droned. Sam kept his mouth shut. Of course, to Dean, a demon was a demon was a demon.

“She doesn’t necessarily conform to the way _your_ average demon works. They predate anything that cooked up downstairs because of us.”

“So, the good ol’ ram’s horn blessed by a rabbi, right through her black, black heart?” Dean asked. Gabriel tipped his head to the side, thinking about it.

“Maybe.”

“That answer,” Castiel said, moving to sit again, as opposed to leaning over Dean’s shoulder. “Is not altogether encouraging.”

A shrug was the only answer that they got out of Gabriel as he shifted to lay back against the pillows on the bed. “Sorry, guys. I’m not a walking authority on _all_ things pagan. If this was, say, Thor or Tyr coming down after you, I’d be more help. But it’s not, so we’re winging it.”

“We’re?” Sam repeated, just looking to gain clarification for himself.

Gabriel raised both eyebrows at him, and the look was clear. “I’m staying,” he said, simple as that. “I came this far, didn’t I?” he didn’t look away, didn’t slide his gaze to the left to take in Dean or Cas, just held Sam’s look with one of his own. Sam would dare to say it was heated, or charged. Maybe because Sam was still trying to find a motive under all this, and Gabriel was still trying to show he didn’t have one, the hunter wasn’t sure. This time it was Dean’s turn to clear his throat and inspire them to break off the look.

“All right, so we’ve got some work on our hands, fine. But we gotta be checked outta here by noon, so...” he looked at Sam, and they nodded at each other.

“I’ll pull up some pages to read on the road. Cas, did you want to—”

A loud snap, and the room was packed up, the beds made and the chairs that they weren’t sitting on pushed in. The words died in Sam’s throat, all three of them looking from the packed duffels on the floor by the door to Gabriel, climbing off the bed. “What? If I’m staying, I’ll be helpful.”

Dean shook his head, pushing the laptop towards Sam without comment. The message was clear enough. He expected someone to take care of, and entertain, Gabriel, and that someone would be Sam.

 

 

* * *

 

Their next motel was a mess within two hours of them being there. They were two states over and down (Arkansas) from where they’d been (Indiana), driving straight minus stops for fuel and food, and once at a copy shop so Sam could print off a few of the pages he’d found particularly useful.  Now those pages were tacked to their motel room wall and both he and Dean were standing in front of it, contemplating what it could tell them about their beast of the week.

“All right, so, what I’m getting from this,” Dean said, tapping one of the pages. “We’ve got a few options. The ram’s horn, cutting off her head, or fire.”

“Yeah, but get this,” Sam pointed to another page that agreed with the beheading theory. “She has to be in her true form for it to work, I think. None of this slinky lady disguise.”

Castiel was quiet on the couch, flipping through copies of the papers on his own, and from what Gabriel could tell, he was looking at them, but he wasn’t actually seeing them. Nothing was sinking in for him. He’d been like this all day. Silent, saying nothing to anyone, really, unless he was spoken to first. Glancing over at the Winchesters, deep in discussion on how to ‘gank’ Ammut, Gabriel made up his mind.

“Hey,” he stepped up in front of Castiel, getting his attention and jerking his thumb over his shoulder, indicating that they should go outside. “Spare me a couple minutes?” Cas followed his gesture to the door, then, after a moment of thinking, nodded and got to his feet. Dean had turned and was giving them both a very careful onceover.

“Just taking my brother aside for a little heart to heart, Deano,” Gabriel assured, shooting him a beatific grin. “Nothing to worry your pretty little head about, rest assured.” Dean apparently took that as an explanation, even if he wasn’t entirely happy about letting either angel out of his sight.

“Just don’t make it too long.”

“Only as long as Cas needs,” Gabriel sing-songed back, holding open the door for Cas to step out before he swung around and went out himself. The two of them walked around the side of the building, Gabriel with his hands in his pockets, Castiel carrying himself in that awkward, stiff way he still tended to. They made it to the vending machines and Gabriel dropped down onto the worn looking bench, looking up at Castiel. “Pull up some bench, baby bro.”

Castiel sat, only furrowing his eyebrows a little.

“So,” Gabriel started, looking the other way to give Cas that added space. “How’s it going?”

He felt the incredulous and vaguely annoyed look boring into the back of his head before he turned back and grinned brightly. The glower Cas levelled him with though, that turned the grin into a laugh.

“You’ve been taking pointers from Sam!” he sobered up, straightening on the bench. “But, seriously bro, you’re all dark and broody and it’s totally harshing on my mellow.”

Castiel sighed, leaning back, relaxing his stance for the first time all day, as far as Gabriel could remember. “I brought this on myself. I set the Leviathans loose because I opened Purgatory. I didn’t listen to Dean, I didn’t even tell Dean until it was too late. Perhaps,” he threaded his fingers through each other, far more transfixed with them then Gabriel’s face. “This is as it should be, and you and Sam and Dean should not endanger yourselves to stall my end.”

Gabriel was staring. He knew he was staring, and he wasn’t going to do anything to stop it. He held the look for nearly five minutes before Castiel finally looked up and caught it, just a bit startled. Then, Gabriel blinked and raised an eyebrow. “You want to go back to Purgatory?”

Castiel’s face crumbled into something vaguely terrified, and Gabriel almost regretted his words. “Honestly, no. Never again.”

“Well, then,” Gabriel clapped him on the back. “Pull on your big girl panties!”

“I don’t understand that—”

“Cas, listen,” Gabriel cut across. “I know you’ve been hanging around the Winchesters for a while, and they rock the whole self-sacrifice thing like a hurricane. And yeah,” he shrugged, tossing his arm around Castiel’s shoulders.  “It’s noble, but here, in this situation? It’s just not necessary.”

Castiel went silent again, clearly contemplating and mulling over the things that Gabriel had told him. When he finally spoke up, his voice was more level, more confident, than it had been. “You really think that? You’re sure?”

Gabriel’s mature and put together response was to blow a raspberry, and roll his eyes. “Yes. Listen, you got your act together to help put dad’s failed experiment back in their box once already. You went on an impromptu trip down under for it, and you’re lucky to have come back with all your limbs and a... fairly sound mind. I hung out in there for a long time, more than I care to remember. I think I know what you went through. Hell, it was probably worse for you.”

Gabriel was sure his words had gotten through to the little once-angel that could when he saw the smile curling over Cas’ face, and the other nodded. “So, you’re saying I should tell Ammut to, as Dean would say, blow me?”

“If you’re feeling ambitious,” Gabriel agreed with a nod of his own. “I wouldn’t recommend it, but you go right ahead, champ. Just make sure you’re got that machete ready when she gets down on her knees.”

From the look at Castiel’s face, Gabriel was sure he didn’t follow, but the other nodded, and he looked that much more ready to face the day. Gabriel counted that as a victory for big brother.

 

 

* * *

 

“We do this tonight.”

Dean was far from in the mood to wait, now that they basically had their pieces in place. Well, figuratively. As far as knowing what pieces they would need, they were in place. It was just a matter of gathering them.

“We’re not doing this in the middle of a motel room,” Sam interjected. Cas nodded silently at his side. Gabriel, however, made a small noise from behind them. He had taken possession of Sam’s laptop again, and apparently had been busy.

“I think there’s an empty warehouse or two back near the edge of town. Remember the industrial area we passed on the way in? Well, according to the local paper, a few of those factories have gone under because of financial strain,” he shrugged one shoulder, but Sam could see the smug light in his eyes. “Not a boxing ring, but it’s more ideal than this 1970s romper room.”

Sam sighed and leaned over, taking his laptop from Gabriel’s hands to snap it shut. He paused with the lid half down and eyed the screen and then Gabriel. “Yeah, these look really helpful,” he muttered, closing the three porn tabs and ignoring Gabriel’s waggling eyebrows. “Anyway, that’s not a half bad idea,” he looked over at Dean, waiting for his brother’s input.

“It would be sufficient,” Castiel piped up after a few seconds of silent discussion between he, Dean and Sam. Sam probably should have been more shocked at how quickly Cas had managed to slip into the ways of reading facial expressions, but then again, former angel, he’d ridden with them for a good chunk of years, it was probably hard not to pick up on their mannerisms and modes of discussion. For his part, Dean nodded, rubbing a hand over the stubble on his chin.

“We can go out there. It sounds like it might be our only option,” he stood up, stretching his arms as he went. “Let’s get the stuff together, head out there. Once we’re set up, we can get rid of the amulets,” he pulled his own out of his pocket and waved it around. “Then I guess we just wait for her to come running.”

“Don’t mind me poking holes in your plan,” Gabriel said, stretching like a cat on the bed. Sam looked away, raising an eyebrow at the look Dean was giving him. “But, how exactly are we going to get her into her true form?”

Oh.

Well, that was a predicament. The look on Dean’s face changed from questioning to put upon. Sam couldn’t really argue with that sentiment, either. Why, exactly, did they always end up with the crazy ones on their tails? Why, exactly, were they so very privileged?

The mattress creaking when Cas got off the bed snapped Sam out of his internal ‘why us’, and he looked around at the other, bent over to zip up a duffel bag, the one containing the tools they’d need for this job. He stood up, hoisting the bag onto his shoulder, and looked at each of them in turn.

“We’ll wing it.”

“What he said.”

Sam didn’t need to be looking at Dean to sense the pride in his voice when he spoke. He had to admit, himself, that it was a pretty big, pretty human change that they, mostly Dean, if he was  honest, had effected in Cas.

The other mattress creaked as Gabriel bounced from lounging to sitting at the edge of the bed, snorting. “This is gonna be a good time,” he stood up, gesturing to the door and the Impala without. “Shall we?”


	5. Chapter 5

Gabriel had been right about the industrial section of town. There was more than a few warehouses that had been shut down, and about three of them had been cleared out, the equipment possibly sold off for profit of some sort while everything else went to crap on the books. The four of them were standing around the duffel bag Cas had packed, silent. Sam, Dean and Cas all held machetes in their hands, Gabriel, the ram’s horn. If anyone could get close to the demon goddess, close enough to not lose their head, it was Gabriel. The machetes gave the rest of them to option to strike without having pounds upon pounds of pressure easily applied to their skulls.

Dean was the first to speak up, kneeling and laying the machete across his thighs to zip up the duffel. “Ready?” he straightened, kicking the duffel to the wall, out of the way, fingers flexing around the handle of the machete.

“Not really,” Gabriel quipped, spinning the ram’s horn around in his hand. “But you’re running this show, cowboy, so you call the plays.” Sam reached over to shove him in the shoulder, smiling just a bit.

“All right, amulets gone,” he said, pulling his own from his jacket before holding out his hand. Cas and Dean pulled out their own and dropped them into his waiting palm, and from there they went to the door, and out it into the gathering dark. “That should bring her running,” he said, walking back towards where the others were standing, tense and ready. Well, except for Gabriel, who looked pretty laid back, all things considered.

No sooner had Dean nodded his agreement with Sam that the gathering dark outside finished gathering and a rumble, almost like thunder, followed it.

“She’s here,” Gabriel singsonged, imitating the oh-so-famous and oh-so-corny line from Poltergeist. Not that he was wrong. Much as she had the first time, Ammut materialised from thin air. One second there was just a dusty, empty space on the floor, the next, she was standing there wearing the same gown she’d worn when she visited Sam. The grin on her face, though, was new. Wide and toothy and full of hunger and – there was no mistaking it – wrath.

“You brought me my dinner,” she said, crossing her elegant arms while she looked over Cas. Her gaze travelled from him to each of them in turn, and then the machetes in their hands. “And you brought utensils to cut him up with? So sweet,” she laughed, the shrill tones bouncing back off the walls in the big empty room. “More hunters need to think like you Winchesters. It makes my life just,” she sucked in a breath through her teeth, her face rapturous. “So much easier.”

“Yikes,” Gabriel muttered from Sam’s right. “Are we always this annoying and sassy?”

Sam snorted softly and muttered back, “Generally? Yes.” Out of the corner of his eye, he caught the smirk that was slipped his way.

“Well, that’s just kind of annoying, really,” and he stepped out of line, heading right towards Ammut. It took the demon a second to catch on that he was approaching her. Her eyes had been on Cas, hunger and anger and hatred battling out for dominance in them. Gabriel was almost to her shoulder before she turned to him, the ram’s horn raised in his fist.

“It’s not going to be that easy,” Sam breathed.

“It’s never this easy,” Ammut replied, not taking her eyes from Gabriel as her arm came up to block his swing, avoiding the tip of the ram’s horn. Gabriel had been ready, and his free hand came up, fingers clamping around her throat, keeping her in place as the hand with the ram’s horn came back around, aiming for her side.

He hadn’t restrained her arms though. Both fists came up, her long, elegant fingers gripping the lapels of Gabriel’s jacket. Then she was spinning, pivoting on her balls of her feet and tossing him away like a rag doll. He crashed to the floor, the ram’s horn bouncing and rolling out of his hand. That was something to see, and not in a good way.

Ammut wiped her hands on the sides of her gown, as though she was washing away some residue, and spun back to face them. She didn’t look so cocky and amused anymore. She looked mad, lips pulled back in a snarl. “Are you _quite_ finished?”

“Yup.”

Sam cursed under his breath. Gabriel, always Gabriel, running his mouth. He couldn’t just stay down and let them take their turn, could he? Ammut turned back and rushed at him with a shriek, her intent clear. It didn’t take half a thought for Sam to drop his machete and pull his gun from the waistband of his jeans. It didn’t take another second for the bullet he fired off to bury itself in Ammut’s exposed shoulder, throwing her off balance and making her stumble, her fingers wrapping around a dangling suspension chain to stay upright. Her chest was heaving, her mouth open wide to suck in air. Something told Sam she hadn’t expected that.

“Get the horn!” Sam called to Gabriel, bending to pick up his dropped blade from the floor, “We’ve got this!”

Dean stepped up next to him, machete up and ready, Cas close at his shoulder in the same stance. “We’ve got this? Sammy, she just tossed an archangel like a cabbage patch doll, but we got this?”

Sam shrugged, feeling just a tinge sheepish behind his bravado. “We’re a distraction?”

“Oh,” Dean said, laughter slipping into his words while he adjusted his grip on his machete. “Because that always ends well,” he gestured forward. “Let’s.”

Sam and Dean rushed forward, machetes up. Ammut heaved herself from her supportive hold on the chain, bracing her feet on the ground and raising her arms, palms up and towards them in what Sam suspected was both a defensive and offensive stance. They both pulled back to swing, leaving the way open for Cas, who came up the middle and dropped his blade down the length of one of her arms. She dropped both, shrieking through gritted teeth as the steel sliced through flesh and muscle from her shoulder to the middle of her forearm, forcing the arm out of its bent position to spare too much tearing.

The three of them took a step back, waiting, holding their hope that would be enough to jump her from this human body to her true form. It had only taken a few shots before for Sam to get her going. With any luck – and when were they ever lucky? – that slice would be enough to bring her around. Her eyes were bright with rage, murderous, an effect that wasn’t altogether pleasant mixed with her deranged, lopsided grin, everything directed towards Cas.

“I like it when they fight back,” she spat. She wasn’t paying attention to her arm, not at all, despite how it was sluggishly painting the floor under it in red. “But, please. Hand him over and this won’t get messy for any of you. Hand him over, and this ends. Your life gets easy.”

Sam was sure that the reason none of them had seen Gabriel coming up behind had been because they were so focused on her – and she on Cas. None of them had seen the archangel coming back into the picture until he was suddenly there, pushing his arm around under her good arm and swinging back, digging the point of the ram’s horn into her belly, the momentum pulling her back against him.

The scream that came from her sounded like nothing that should come from any living creature. It sounded like metal ripping, was what it sounded like. The sound from Sam’s dream state, a thousand times worse in the real world. She was screaming and writhing and _changing._ That was where Gabriel took his cue, pulling back from her body, but not in time. Not before her hands curled into paws and the lion’s razor sharp claws caught in his jacket – and his flesh – tearing it with a spurt of red, red blood. Gabriel didn’t make any real sound of pain, only grimaced, clapping a hand over his torn flesh while he moved to backpedal.

But still, not fast enough. Ammut changed, so much faster than she had when she’d gone after Sam, the crocodile’s head and jaw exploding out of her human face, her legs going thick and stocky and the fur exploding on her torso in a matter of, maybe, two seconds. She wasn’t done changing when she whirled, twisting her reptilian head and clamping those jaws down on the bicep of Gabriel’s damaged arm.

Gabriel made a noise then. A big one, a loud one, and Sam knew, he knew it was dangerous to get too close, the archangel probably had this covered.

But he had an opening, and he took it.

In two steps, he was within striking distance, and with one swing the steel blade of the machete was embedding itself in Ammut’s thick neck. Not all the way through, it wasn’t a clean cut. Three quarters of the way, maybe. He wasn’t all that concerned about getting it clean off, though. His concern was Gabriel, and the jaws that loosened and dropped off of him as Ammut’s chimera body sank to the floor.

Gabriel stared up at him, his damaged arm hanging uselessly from the shoulder for the moment, blood caking his canvas jacket from the tear the claws made and the multiple punctures the teeth had left. Sam dropped his machete, reaching out to steady Gabriel – unnecessarily, surely – with a hand on his good shoulder. “You all right?”

Gabriel opened his mouth like he was going to answer, instead shrugging the shoulder Sam was clasping, his mouth twisting in a ‘eh, I’ll live’ kind of expression. Sam wanted to ask what that meant, what he had been going to say, but Dean was behind him, and then beside him, finishing the job of severing Ammut’s head, and yelling for Cas to grab the gas.

That was an entirely unnecessary order, as Cas was already walking over with the gas can in hand, but Sam figured Dean needed something to fill the silence.

He caught his brother’s eye, and the look he received in return confirmed that suspicion. Definitely something to fill the tense silence Ammut had left in her wake.

 

 

* * *

 

Gabriel healed rapidly. That was only to be expected. He was an archangel, still heavily burdened with grace, despite everything, and a few bites and scratches weren’t going to drop him. Even so, he was weak. Sam suspected, and Cas had all but outright confirmed, that the healing, especially wounds inflicted by a powerful pagan creature that fancied herself a goddess and wasn’t far off the abilities thereof, would take a bit out of him. Gabriel didn’t say much, just dropped down onto Sam’s bed and snapped himself up some pay-per-view. That had been the end of the discussion over just how rundown facing Ammut had made him.

Dean had made the call that they all might as well call it a night, recharge their batteries and get out of there come morning. Hours had passed and they’d seen neither head nor tail of anything that may have been Ammut-related, so it seemed safe to assume the threat had passed. Sam, by virtue of a coin toss, - Dean complained that a game of rock-paper-scissors was way too rigged in Sam’s favour for his liking – was afforded the most comfortable sleeping space of the lazyboy armchair, while Dean got the couch again and Cas was once again in possession of a bed. He’d tried to offer it up to either of them, but had been shot down, and within the hour, everyone, even, Sam suspected, Gabriel, had drifted off into some form of sleep.

Everyone except him.

He kept going over what had happened in the warehouse, and not just the bloody and thankfully short battle with Ammut. What was sticking out, sitting pretty and persistent in his mind, was the way Gabriel had seemed open to saying something before he’d just shrugged his ‘okay’. By the fifth or sixth time analysing the whole thing, Sam was starting to get a headache.

He needed to get some air.

Quiet as he could, he pulled himself up and out of the lazyboy, the old springs creaking no matter what he did to keep them from protesting. It didn’t seem to matter, though, as none of the others stirred – not even Gabriel – and he made his way across the room to the door, scooping up one of the keys on his way by the dinette table, before slipping out.

The parking lot, this one fenced in, just a little upscaled from their last motel, was nearly full, lots of people stopping in on their way through town, though Sam vaguely remembered seeing some advertisement on the way into town about a festival going on that weekend. Something to do with some kind of agriculture, apples or something to that effect, he didn’t quite remember. Probably wasn’t all that important, given they’d be leaving in the morning.

“Can’t sleep, Sammy?”

The sound of the motel room door clicking closed behind Dean didn’t really surprise him, and he hadn’t been too surprised to hear his brother’s question. Dean had a sixth sense for this crap, he just knew when Sam was taking off for some broody alone time, and sometimes he invited himself along.

This time, Sam wasn’t all that put out to see him.

“Can’t stop thinking long enough to pass out, actually,” Sam answered, shooting Dean a small smile. “Go figure, right?”

Dean shrugged, moving to the Impala’s trunk to pop it open. “I could make some comment about my brainiac little brother not being able to shut down for a few hours, but I think you’ve heard ‘em all,” he pulled a half finished bottle of whiskey from the trunk and passed it to Sam. “No fun in repeating myself.”

Sam chuckled, opening the bottle to take a drink while Dean slammed the trunk shut again. His brother came over to lean against the rear door of the Impala next to him and he handed over the bottle without comment.

They stayed like that for a few minutes in comfortable silence, sharing the whiskey between them. Sam didn’t explain and Dean didn’t make any noise about him spilling the beans. The main thing was the companionship between the two of them in the dead of the slightly cold night.

It was when Sam noticed how much the temperature had dropped from earlier that evening that Dean shivered and made all the movements Sam knew well. He was going to ask what had been on his brother’s mind, and Sam found he didn’t have the strength to distract him from it, right now. “So, what were you thinking about that kept you up, anyway, poindexter?”

Sam stayed silent for a few more minutes, much to Dean’s apparent annoyance. He was doing his best not to rush him though, fiddling with the whiskey bottle, turning to examine things like the casing around the Impala’s rear windshield. When Sam finally came to terms with what it was that was plaguing his thoughts, and figured out he’d have to tell Dean now or risk making him mad or freaked out later, Dean was about ready to burst.

“You wouldn’t...” he started, then bite his tongue and edited himself. “I know I have what you probably think of as freaky tastes.”

Dean held up a hand. “I’m gonna stop you there, Sam. I have a feeling I know the answer to this long, drawn out monologue, so, if I may?” Sam narrowed his eyes, trying to read what Dean thought he knew, before rolling them and making a ‘go on’ gesture with his hand.

Dean took a second of his own, like he had something to come to terms with. If he was right, Sam thought, then he probably did. But the chances of Dean being on the money...

“Is this about Gabriel?”

...Were apparently really good chances.

That threw Sam for a second. It had taken him – _him –_ this long to catch on to the truth of his own twisted up and confused feelings towards the former Trickster, and Dean was apparently a step ahead of him. He’d seen or understood the things that Sam hadn’t, up until now? Not that Dean was blind, and especially not when it came to Sam, but he himself hadn’t noticed what was going on, what was changing in himself and his behaviour, it was almost unimaginable that Dean had cottoned on.

Like he was cottoning on now, with Sam’s silence as an answer.

“Oh, what? You think I... care, do you, Sam?” Dean asked, the hint of a smirk showing in the corners of his mouth.

“It’s a legitimate concern,” Sam protested weakly.

“What, because he’s a dude?” Dean asked, and Sam caught the spark of hurt in his eyes, enough to stop him from pointing out that _technically_ the angels didn’t have genders, though, yes, he would always think of both Castiel and Gabriel as men. Dean’s hurt though, stung. Hurt that Sam would ever think that something like being interested in someone, man or woman, would make him think less of him, after everything they been through.

“Hah, no,” Sam said quickly, wanting to bury that spark of possible crushing hurt before it could get any worse. “I know you could learn to deal with that, it wouldn’t be much of an issue for you, I mean... You experimented enough over the years,” for once, Dean didn’t protest the face, just shrugged one shoulder and let Sam continue, “and you know as well as I do, you just can’t help who you’re attracted to, right?”

“Right,” Dean said slowly, eying Sam like he was trying to decipher the meaning of his rambles before he got to the point. “Can I just say something really quickly while we’re on the subject of Gabriel’s junk?”

Sam raised an eyebrow and nodded, allowing him to go on.

“All right, well, the thing is, you’re my brother, and it’s pretty much a non-issue, I’m going to look after you and love you, regardless of if you’re in bed with a girl or a guy,” he started. Sam supposed it was good they were having the heart to heart sexuality talk while the floor was open, even if, just maybe, it was years overdue. “Now, Sammy, I’ve gotta say this one thing; yeah, you’ve almost always been with a chick. I know that, you know that, but, especially with this on the table? What do they call people who are into people not because of their pants situation?”

“Pansexual?” Sam supplied.

“That’s it,” Dean said, snapping his fingers. “Anyway, you. That’s how you strike me, after knowing you your whole life. You like people for who they are, their biology is just an added bonus.” Sam thought about it for a second, tipping his head to the side. “You probably have a preference for chicks, or something, if that’s how this goes, but let’s be honest, Sam, the first time we met the guy, you were flirting so hard I thought I’d see smoke pouring out of your ears.”

Sam balked, wincing and looking Dean’s way. “I didn’t.”

“Oh yeah you did. And then? You told Bobby about it, and you didn’t even seem to notice how much you were playing up the saga of your eyelash batting and shy smiles. Seriously, Sammy.”

Sam groaned. Of course he had. Maybe that was why none of this was really coming as a surprise to Dean.

“I’m just saying, in the end, man, lady, I don’t care, so long as it makes you happy. So, you say that’s not the issue concerning me, I’m gonna believe you.”

“It’s not,” Sam answered earnestly.

“Then, what, Sam?”

Sam sighed. So much for Dean’s moment of clarity and deep understanding of the issue before it was laid out. “Because he’s _Gabriel_.”

“Oh!” Dean paused, then shrugged a shoulder. “Well, yeah. I’m not too thrilled about who he was, Sam, I’ll be honest. I don’t think you can fault me that,” he moved back to lean against the side of the Impala again, and Sam settled back next to him. “But he reneged on all that crap, didn’t he?” Sam thought about the fact that Gabriel was alive _again_ and the ‘again’ was only because he had already died fighting the good fight – their fight – once. He thought about the fact that Gabriel had been an ass to them before, but he’d always been doing it in the interest of their own good, in a way. And then he thought about the fact that Gabriel had pulled him out of a motel room dream with a seriously deranged goddess, and ridden with them this far to put her down, when he didn’t really have anything to gain on it. Yeah, he’d reneged, that seemed like a good way to put it.

“Besides,” Dean continued. “It isn’t me he’d have to make his past douche behaviour up to, is it?”

Sam shrugged and answered immediately. “If anything were to even happen.”

“Hey,” Dean said, clapping him on the shoulder. “You’ll never know if anything could happen if you don’t even go for it.” Sam tipped his head in agreement.”I gotta ask though, Sam...”

Sam turned to look at him, raising an eyebrow in confusion. “Yeah?”

He should have known what was coming when the smirk jumped on to Dean’s face. “Pitch or catch?”


	6. Chapter 6

Gabriel was still with them, three days later, and Dean was starting to get antsy. Maybe because he knew that Sam still hadn’t said anything, but maybe because of the fact that the archangel was still hanging out and didn’t give any explanation except for ‘I like the company’. More than likely it was that second reason, but Sam wasn’t stupid enough to miss the looks he was being given.

And not only by Dean, either. Castiel had taken on some kind of weird, motherly look mixed with a curious gaze. It was disturbing, to say the least, and had Sam contemplating whether Dean had kept the revelation to himself and Cas had cottoned on by himself, or if the two of them had discussed it. Gabriel was the only one who didn’t seem to have noticed that something was up with Sam. If he did, he sure wasn’t saying or letting on at all.

Things came to a head a week later. Dean said he had to go check out a lead on Crowley, and he was gonna take Cas with him for a gopher. On his way out the door he shot Sam a grin and wink.

“Behave yourselves, you two. Don’t forget a sock!”

It was a testament to their years upon years of open-ended ribbing between the two of them that Sam only levelled him with a look but otherwise was unphased by his ridiculous jokes. Then they were gone and the room was quiet. Sam turned back to his laptop and Gabriel back to the TV. Another day that Sam didn’t have to confront anything about anything that had occurred to him since Gabriel had come crashing back into their world.

“You wanna talk to me about anything, Sam?”

Or not.

“You can’t read minds, can you?” Sam asked, trying to deflect the conversation. Sure, he should have it, but he was far from ready to.

Gabriel grinned. “I _can_ , but I have to try at it. Why, is there something you want me to read, Sambo?”

Sam instantly threw up walls, thinking about anything but what he was supposed to bring up, eventually. At least, that was the idea, but if anything it just made him think about it more. “No.”

“Ooh, I think you’re lying!” Gabriel said, pushing himself up to scoot to the end of the bed and lean forward, grinning wolfishly. “What’s on your mind, Winchester? Come on, you can tell me!”

He’d successfully cornered himself, Sam knew that well enough. “Listen, yeah, I guess I do,” he said, trying to give in to the fact that it had to come out sooner or later. “You gotta promise you’ll let me get this out before you say anything or run off or anything like that, okay?”

Gabriel’s face went serious and he nodded. “Yeah, Sam, you got me until you’re done. The floor is yours.”

Sam nodded, slowly closing the lid of his laptop, taking the time to try and organise his thoughts. “All right. So, you know we haven’t always been the best of friends. Hell, we probably aren’t the _best_ of friends right now. There’s a lot of crap in our past, blood on both sides. We both know that.” Gabriel was nodding, looking just a little lost in the proceedings. That had to mean that he was respecting Sam and staying out of his thoughts, letting him do the explaining himself. That was a relief.“But, I think I’m starting to understand that even if you went about it the wrong way, you did always, sort of, have our interests at heart. A little bit. I mean, yeah, you were looking out for yourself and your family first, but I want to think that just a little bit of you was looking out for Dean and I too, or else you wouldn’t have tried so hard, you know, in Broward County.” Another nod, and a look that just about screamed ‘finally, you’re catching on that I was a douche for fun _and_ education’. “And at the Elysian Fields hotel, you put your neck on the line and took our side in the end, and now, I mean,” Sam opened his hands to take in the room. “You’re here with us, you put yourself in the line of fire with Ammut, you don’t really have anything to gain from riding around the country with us, I don’t think...”

Gabriel raised his hand, silently asking permission to speak. Sam nodded.

“Not to cut you across here, kiddo, but where are you going with this? You trying to say you understand me now and you want to be the bestest of best friends?” he raised a finger for pause. ”Not that I don’t think we can’t be, because, I’ll be honest, I really like hanging around you – you guys.”

Sam thought over the last week, the nights spent in front of his laptop with Gabriel while the archangel shared his knowledge, the few meals together, the four of them driving in the Impala and just talking and joking, amid the occasion jab on Gabriel’s side at the inefficiency of the Impala compared to the way he _could_ have them travel. Gabriel was fitting in just fine, and, while Sam couldn’t entirely speak for Cas and Dean, he was welcome and wanted. He was a nice presence to have around, and maybe it was Sam’s newly understood feelings for him, but things all sort of clicked into place in a way they hadn’t in years. In nearly a decade.

“That, yeah, sure,” Sam allowed, taking a breath to give his next words power. “Gabe, the thing is, I have to be honest in this; I like you. I mean, you as a person, a being, whatever, I like you as a friend, but somehow, I don’t even understand how, you’ve managed to make me—”

“Sam, hold on,” Gabriel interrupted. “Are you trying to tell me you have a _crush_ on me? Like some friggin’ schoolgirl? ‘Do you like me, check yes, no, maybe’? Like that?”

Sam swallowed. Gabriel had summed it up, if not in the way he would have, he’d at least gotten the gist of it. “I, uh, yeah?”

Gabriel shook his head. Sam really didn’t like that gesture, or the look on the archangel’s face. It wasn’t what he’d hoped for, and it didn’t look like calm rejection, either. “Sam, listen,” Gabriel said. “It’s my turn to talk, okay, so just, listen really carefully. I need you to understand what I am about to say to you.”

Sam nodded, muttering a quiet ‘yeah, okay’. If anything of their friendship could be salvaged enough to keep Gabriel hanging around, he had to help it. He wouldn’t let Cas and Dean be out a friend and a help because he couldn’t keep himself from falling for the guy.

“Okay,” Gabriel said, pressing his hands together, palm to palm. “Sam, the thing is, you’re a great guy. You’re brave, you care, too much, like I’ve said, you’re funnier than you give yourself credit for, you’re strong, you’ve got this heart that’s big enough to love the entire world, and,” he stood up, pacing his way across the room, eyes on the floor, then the ceiling, anything but Sam himself. “You’re smart. Your forehead is so big because it has to deal with that gigantic, brilliant brain of yours. It’s why I’m sorry.”

Sam nodded, looking down at the tabletop. Rejection was rejection, and it wasn’t the first time he’d met up with it, so he wasn’t new to this. Just a few minutes and it would pass from a sore to a dull ache, and in a few days he could probably bury it altogether.

But Gabriel was climbing into his lap, an impressive feat, given the small, flimsy quality of the chair Sam was sitting in, and grinning like the cat who got the canary. “It’s why I’m sorry, because you actually believed for a second that I was shutting you down,” he settled as best he could, hands on Sam’s shoulders very possibly the only thing that kept him from tipping off and onto the floor. “I stumped that gigantic, brilliant brain of yours, and for that, I apologise.” The hands on Sam’s shoulders moved, one to press to the curve of his jaw, and the other to curl around his neck. “Not apologising for this, though.”

Gabriel would be the one to instigate it, and Gabriel would be the one to make the first kiss overly wordy and full of jokes, and Sam might not have been able to keep the curve of a smile from twitching his lips, but he was the one to surge up that short distance and capture Gabriel’s smirking mouth. His hands went from useless at his sides to gripping the archangel’s hips to keep him steady on the rickety chair as Gabriel pressed forward against him, deepening the kiss with a nip of his teeth and a swipe of his tongue. Sam gave as good as he got until they were both panting, even if Gabriel technically didn’t need to breathe, foreheads pressed together, a smile twitching from soft to full-blown on his face as he caught his breath.

“I’m gonna... I’m gonna say you’re not opposed to my schoolgirl crush on you?”

“Oh, kiddo,” Gabriel pressed forward, trailing his mouth over the curve of Sam’s jaw, arms curling over his shoulders, his full weight dropping into Sam’s lap. “Not at all, but,” his lips pressed to the curve where Sam’s neck and shoulder met, and Sam’s hand drifted up from his hip over the curve of his shoulder. “I think it’s less schoolgirl crush and more you full-on fell into it with me. At least,” he leaned back out, and for the first time Sam saw the hint of doubt in those golden brown eyes. “That’s what happened to me, long before Luci used me for a pin cushion, damn your sasquatch powers, so I sure hope—”

“Gabriel,” Sam said softly, “Just shut up.”

And Gabriel did. Maybe it was Sam’s answer to everything being that things were far beyond a schoolgirl crush. Maybe it was his tongue tracing a line over those slightly parted lips.

More than likely, it was a mix of both, but Sam wasn’t hearing a complaint.

And he if was being entirely honest with himself – something that seemed to be working out so far, if the archangel pressed close was any indication – he knew; he wouldn’t.

 

 

**_FIN._ **

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's it, that's the minibang.
> 
> I hope you've enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. 
> 
> Once again, a huge thanks to my artist, the amazing and sweet Steph (AndLatitude) who did the art featured in the first three chapters, which ca be found here. And an equally huge thank to my support team, the people who stuck it out with me while I was ranting and raving over this thing, and doubting my ability to ever write something that could follow in Ridiculous' wake. You guys put up with a lot, and I thank you from the bottom of my heart for it.
> 
> Finally, thank you to you, the reader, for toughing it out and reading far enough to hit this endnote. Your readership is impossible to undermine, and I appreciate it very, very much.


End file.
